Tatters of Hope
by Caslia
Summary: Living his lonely life on Tatooine after the rise of the Empire, Obi-wan has a quiet moment in which he contemplates all that has happened. Very angsty


Disclaimer: If you really, really want a 3-year-old Mac computer, a broken Nintendo 64 and an obnoxious little brother, than go ahead, sue me. Otherwise, you all know I don't really own anything. Especially these wonderful characters created by George Lucas.

SUMMARY: This is based on a character challenge from another board. 'Write a post about Obi-wan and his cloak'. Written pr-release of RotS

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Tatters of Hope

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The nights on Tatooine were cold. Bitterly cold, so that your soul froze along with your body in the dark. That might seem strange, considering the planet was nothing but endless dunes of sand, scrutinized from above by a pair of red eyes, twins suns, who turn their gaze from the desert world only when the chill winds of night begin to blow.

Obi-wan pulled his cloak closer around himself, grateful not for the first time for its warmth and companionship. Here, within the sand hovel he had called home for the past seven years, he was grateful for any small gift of warmth or kindness. They came so rarely to the Jedi Knight.

Though its fabric was coarse, and in places it had been worn to the point of become threadbare, so that the wind that crept under the door breathed lightly upon it and made him shiver, the cloak held. Held together with determination and an iron will Obi-wan was only just beginning to realize he had within; held together like the tattered remains of his hopes. But he clung to them, clung to the ripping, ragged fabric of the cloak as a drowning man clings at the foam that dons the waves of the ocean.

What else did he have, after all?

Nothing. Nothing else to hold on to, to put his faith in, to cling to during those long, cold, lonely nights, save the tattered ends of hope, the thought of two young children, and the frayed cloak.

It would have to be enough.

And though the night was bitter, Obi-wan was not. In the falling darkness, the darkness that slowly spread its hand across the sky outside and the Darkness that had spread its hand across the galaxy, the Jedi Knight pulled the cloak closer to his aging body and wondered of another man, somewhere out there, alone and cold in the Darkness.

He could not help but wish that man also had a cloak to cling to, to pull around him and block out the cold. Had some tattered hope such as Obi-wan's that kept him going despite the loneliness of the night.

It was the thought that this hope was so utterly in vain, not the wind that crept from beneath the door, that had Obi-wan shivering,

And pulling that cloak close around him, not hiding from the cold but taking a defiant stand against it, Obi-wan thought back. To warm his heart if not his body, he thought back to before, in the moments this cloak had once again come to his aid. And while some of them were like a sharp stab of pain in his soul, others were so bittersweet his fingers turned white as he held to the memories embodied in the fabric.

He had grown out of all his other cloaks, those he had worn as an apprentice in the old Jedi Temple. He was constantly growing, gaining height as he gained knowledge of the Force, far faster than his peers. 'Oafy-wan' had outgrown all his friends, and though they did eventually catch up with him when they were adults, it had always been something of an embarrassment to constantly be outgrowing his cloaks.

Master Qui-gon had never minded.

He said his talented apprentice was a growing boy. It only made sense he would need new cloaks. And when Obi-wan had finally stopped growing, Qui- gon had given him his last cloak. It was nothing special, in no way different than all the others throughout the years.

Except that it was _his_ cloak.

Jedi are not materialistic. They do not become attached to their robes or their cloaks or their boots or their belts as they do to their lightsabers, for cloaks cannot defend you from your enemies.

And perhaps Obi-wan would not have taken any notice of his cloak, not thought anything of the cloth that had rested upon his shoulders all these years, if he had not lost everything else. His friends, who had been as much his family as had the Jedi Order. His master, his beloved apprentice, his queen to whom he had sworn his loyalty till death. And the children, the little twin babes who were destined to save the galaxy.

The galaxy Obi-wan had considered nothing more than a duty, as he had considered his cloak as nothing more than a possession. Now, like his apprentice, like his master, it was gone, somewhere beyond his reach.

The cloak he had worn at Qui-gon's cremation. He had hidden within its folds and grieved quietly. And bending down, he had spoken with the boy to whom his master had charged him. He made a promise, to train the boy as best he could, to teach him the way of the Jedi. And Anakin had nodded. But as the fire began to die and the Masters turned away, the little boy's tears finally began to fall.

Touched, Obi-wan knelt and with the edge of his cloak, wiped away the child's tears. He would later use the sleeve of that cloak to dry his own tears as he stood alone, staring at the empty rooms he had shared with his master at the Temple.

He nearly lost his cloak that day on Geonosis, but when the battle was over and Anakin within the care of the healers, Obi-wan had journeyed back with the Masters to the building the Separatists had used as their headquarters. And though they had found nothing to hint at the plans of their enemies, Master Windu had stepped forth and offered Obi-wan his discarded cloak.

Absently, Kenobi took it, thinking not of his cloak, but of those that lay scattered across the rocky plains of the planet, where Jedi had died.

Jedi, in the fight for justice, for peace.

He stood, wrapped in his cloak and considering the situation in which the galaxy had found itself as his young apprentice said his wedding vows. He stood, again, in that cloak, angry and hurt, in the halls of the palace of Theed, as soft spoken, teary-eyed Padme explained her husband was gone, and within her she bore the fruit of their love.

And as they fled the palace as Palpatine's forced rained down upon them, he wrapped the pregnant senator in his cloak and, lifting the woman who carried the hope of the galaxy within her, rushed for his ship, for escape, for safety.

Obi-wan had stood on the cliffs of Mustafar, the wind whipping the cloak about him, and begged for Anakin to lower his saber, to step away from the dark hand that reached for him, threatening to grasp the young man in its iron grip and refuse to let go. The Jedi knelt on those very same cliffs, his hand empty, his eyes searching, for the boy who had had refused to take his hand and plummeted into the lava which licking the rocks below.

Cloak and master charred-blacked, had turned their backs upon Mustafar and left. Left the boy he thought dead, left the apprentice he had loved and lost.

Space stretched out before him as he made his way to Dagobah.

The twins were born. Two beautiful, bright children of the Force, destined to save the galaxy from the bitter Darkness that had fallen. Wrapped in his cloak, a heart-wrenching, bittersweet smile gracing her face, Padme held her children for the first and final time. The good-byes were full of tears, between mother and children, between two friends who had formed a bond in time of need, and his cloak was damp when Obi-wan again fled to his ship. The little boy, Luke, held close in his arms, Kenobi made for Tatooine.

And here he was. Childless, friendless, nearly hopeless. With a cloak wrapped tight around shoulders that ached from the burdens of loss, grief and loneliness. From the woes of a galaxy and the monster that had been unleashed upon it.

Now time stretched out before him.

Years would pass, here alone in the cold, always with the knowledge darkness would descend again when the red eyes closed, with nothing but the cloak, with the memories to warm him. And in his mind, Obi-wan imagined the cloak was the galaxy, rendered to shreds by the hand of Darkness, and the stars were the tears he had wiped away. And the black emptiness was from all the times he had pulled the cloak close, to block out the pain, to block out the sadness.

And somewhere out there was his hope. Somewhere out there were the tattered remains of everything he had ever loved, ever cared about.

And by some silent, mysterious hand of the Force, or maybe that of Fate, the galaxy would be woven back together, the strands placed on a loom and intertwined so that this threadbare cloak was whole again. And somehow, someday, everything would be all right again.

That was Obi-wan's hope. That was the tattered remains of all his dreams, held together with nothing more than tears and determination.

It would have to be enough.

Pulling his cloak closer against the cold, Obi-wan laid down on his pallet in the little sand hovel he called home, in this desert wasteland amid his tattered hopes, and tired to sleep.

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Hope you liked :D Caslia


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